General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe total area of solar panels it would take to power the world, Europe, and Germany
http://boingboing.net/2014/06/12/the-total-area-of-solar-panels.html
RKP5637
(67,112 posts)SkyDaddy7
(6,045 posts)ARMY it would take to defend the solar panel field from "The Crazies" that lurk in that area? But that would still be a very very small price to pay!
RKP5637
(67,112 posts)ball of dirt all by itself and many people just have to hate and war ... amazing.
johnlucas
(1,250 posts)Oh sure some of us are pretty cool.
On an individual one-by-one basis we can be pretty decent.
In groups though...............yeah...
You heard Tommy Lee Jones from Men In Black:
"A PERSON is smart. People are dumb panicky animals and you know it."
John Lucas
RKP5637
(67,112 posts)CSStrowbridge
(267 posts)This plan wouldn't work. Having centralized solar panels like that wouldn't work because it is not 100% efficient to transport electricity through wires and a concentration of solar farms in those areas would cause environmental problems. Granted, these environmental problems are not bad as even the cleanest natural gas plant, but they do exist.
Instead, make it free for people to install solar panels on their houses, but in exchange they have to sell excess electricity back into the grid for free, until the cost of the solar panels and installation is paid for. You decentralize the power generation, which will make up for the lower levels of sunlight most places get. Even if you live in a temperate rain forest, like Seattle, solar power makes sense. In places like Arizona have larger solar farms to generate electricity on an industrial scale and of course put money into R&D for batteries to store excess electricity.
Lenomsky
(340 posts)not a plan.
Solar is already decentralised .. in the UK and EU anyway. Solar can be 'tuned' for want of a better word to utilise the most abundant frequencies of light in a region. It's not super efficient but it's still in it's infancy.
There has been some discussion and testing using the electricity produced to split water into it's components H and O but that's very inefficient.
You can purchase solar outright or have it installed for free and 'feed in' to the grid (UK).
SkyDaddy7
(6,045 posts)Even a "Capitalistic" middle ground that folks like the Koch Brothers are fighting to prevent all over the country is...If lets say, you & I, wanted to start our own business & we bought 500 acres & covered it with solar panels simply to sell back into the system this is ILLEGAL in every state as far as I know. In Georgia they just doubled down on preventing anyone from doing this & I have read about other states doing the same...So much for "Letting the market decide!"
Orsino
(37,428 posts)It's intended to show the small total area that world solar power would require.
Perhaps it should have been compared to the sizes of the nations we have invaded for petroleum.
Jamastiene
(38,187 posts)That is a good idea.
csziggy
(34,137 posts)Or the graves of the people who die from the pollution from oil and other fossil fuels.
Aerows
(39,961 posts)right there.
Dark n Stormy Knight
(9,771 posts)Sorry, I know this is an old post. But I was researching a topic and found this and I had to comment.
goldent
(1,582 posts)This is based on an idea of putting solar panels where there is most solar energy present, particularly various parts of northern Africa. There might be some issues though with the politics of doing this.
SkyDaddy7
(6,045 posts)The reason they show it in that area of Africa is that is where the SUN IS...And YES, a massive solar field has been proposed for that area of Africa & seriously looked at by many European & African countries all of which are desperate for sources of energy especially those that don't come from Russia & happen to be clean. Not to mention many corporations who look to make a lot of money of such a project. That is before that area melted into pure chaos.
Now, I seriously doubt you give a damn about why I said what I said but if you do care about the truth the link is below...And I stand by my original comments. Which you should go back a read again after you read the article linked below AND do some more research on your own so you have a firm understanding of the topic before embarrassing yourself again with the typical DU CRY of "...the nations we have invaded for petroleum. " especially when it has nothing to do with the discussion! geez.
http://inhabitat.com/worlds-largest-solar-project-sahara-desert/sahara-solar-map2/
quakerboy
(13,920 posts)the army.
Regardless, why centralize it. Make solar panels our standard roofing material, around the world. Scatter panels through arizona, Utah, Texas, and all the other American states with great sun coverage. Chile has a nice high desert that could support a fair number of panels scattered about. Mongolia and China do not lack sun drenched land. Theres plenty of desert land in African nations that are not at war and would require minimal security efforts.
No need to go to war zones for solar power.
SkyDaddy7
(6,045 posts)Before the area melted into chaos there were very real proposals to build a solar field big enough to provide power to much of Europe & northern Africa!!
http://inhabitat.com/worlds-largest-solar-project-sahara-desert/sahara-solar-map2/
Even in peaceful times it would take a HUGE force to guard against terrorism or looting for metal or whatever. Just fun to think about such things
southerncrone
(5,506 posts)PatrickforO
(14,586 posts)Of course, they'd have to be spread out simply because the power must be moved from the panel to a local power station for distribution through the grid.
This would also mean the entire fleet of carbon-burning cars would have to be changed over to plug in batteries. This would mean the poorest among us would need subsidies to afford such a vehicle.
Is our species capable of implementing such a far-reaching policy? Are our politicians capable of exhibiting the courage to fight big oil, big coal and big automobile to put something like this in place?
Nah.
Sadly.
RKP5637
(67,112 posts)have what it takes, at least the current crop.
cheapdate
(3,811 posts)The area for the world looks to be a square around 300 km (186 miles) to a side. That would be like covering the entire western half of the state of Tennessee from Nashville to Memphis in a continuous, unbroken, solar panel. I support solar power. I think we could learn to live with consuming a fraction of the electricity that we consume at present.
Uncle Joe
(58,405 posts)Thanks for the thread, redqueen.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)Uncle Joe
(58,405 posts)theHandpuppet
(19,964 posts)duhneece
(4,116 posts)And even then, demand independent confirmation. I'm TRYING hard to think of how best to respond.
Squinch
(50,993 posts)jeff47
(26,549 posts)Tuesday Afternoon
(56,912 posts)Thanks.
FrodosPet
(5,169 posts)Tuesday Afternoon
(56,912 posts)FrodosPet
(5,169 posts)There is already a lot of stress on the grid.
Unless you live in a constantly dark and dreary place, solar is going to help. But the biggest challenge is power storage - do you sell it to the power companies and buy it back at night, or do you spend thousands on batteries that are only good for maybe 10 to 15 years?
We gotta go solar. But it is a major challenge, and it is not as clean and as pretty as we want to think. Even in the barest looking desert - plants and animals live there, and we are going to have to disturb their habitat. We are going to have to mine a lot of copper - and that is a filthy process.
Blanks
(4,835 posts)In one instance they talk about electric cars being hooked up to the grid so that in a system where a person didn't drive every day (like myself) the electric energy is stored in the car during the day and released back into the grid at night.
Another one talked about an innovation in electric batteries that stored the electricity in molten metal - some interesting research that's being done.
I guess my point is that there are people aware that it's a problem and research is progressing to solve the problem in multiple ways.
OnlinePoker
(5,725 posts)oldhippie
(3,249 posts)Don't tell them about that. They don't want to hear it.
Blanks
(4,835 posts)I don't think we get the losses quite as bad as they were even a few years ago.
jeff47
(26,549 posts)And each chemistry has it's own foibles.
NiCd batteries need to be completely drained before recharging, or they lose capacity. NiMH have some of the same effect, but not nearly as badly.
Li-ion batteries do not need to be discharged, but they are damaged most by the transition from about 30% to 0% and from about 90% to 100% (IOW, don't "top off" your cell phone or laptop if it's close to full, and try to not drain it completely) But if you keep it between 90% and 30%, it lasts a very long time.
Those are the ones I can remember off the top of my head. I'd have to go look up what the various lead-acid types are stressed by.
kristopher
(29,798 posts)The price/kwh is steadily dropping and the standard to beat is daily full discharges for 26 years (10,000 cycles) while maintaining above 80% of original capacity.
This is the reason Musk has released the patents on Tesla technology, he wants to encourage participation in the industry in order to spur manufacturing investment, which is the key to further cost reductions.
jeff47
(26,549 posts)EV batteries have to be light and small. "Grid" batteries do not. They can be enormous and incredibly heavy.
A lead-acid array can already beat your standard. But it's way too enormous to run an EV. But since a "grid" battery is just sitting in a building, enormous isn't a problem.
Voice for Peace
(13,141 posts)I live in Albuquerque. There is so much sun here..
you wouldn't need to store it, share it, sell it or
measure it. But Sadly Susana is being taken in
by the Koches.
oldhippie
(3,249 posts)You never use electricity at night? OK.
Voice for Peace
(13,141 posts)as you know there are about 300 days of sunshine per year
here in New Mexico, give or take a few depending on the
state of the climate.. I believe the number of sunny days are
increasing, and we will soon need to figure out a way to
make water from sunlight.. but that's an aside.
What I am suggesting is we have extra here, and somebody
ought to be harvesting it in a big way.
oldhippie
(3,249 posts)you said "... wouldn't need to store it..."
That's what you said. Now you say, "... wouldn't need to store a ton of it ..."
Just admit you misspoke and move on. Otherwise your credibility is shot.
Voice for Peace
(13,141 posts)fellow human being's lighthearted post about solar power, and
move on.
But let us move on in peace. I did not misspeak, though
from your perspective I did. From my point of view, it is
you who has misspoken. It's 100% subjective.
oldhippie
(3,249 posts)Anyone that points out your error is unnecessarily and thoughtlessly nitpicking your words and should not say anything.
When you are speaking about technical subjects, that's called peer review. Engineers are not supposed to let technical errors like that pass. It sometimes gets people killed.
Voice for Peace
(13,141 posts)Please forgive me if I have misunderstood you.
All I know about solar is there's a hellalot of it
here, more than enough to share.
aggiesal
(8,923 posts)aqueducts like the California aqueduct.
This would do 2 things:
1) Create energy
2) Protect needed water from evaporating.
We should also have solar panels built into the roof of cars, buses, trucks and trains (especially electric trains).
There is a meme going around Facebook that India is already doing something like this.
So much for the U.S. being a "world leader".
greiner3
(5,214 posts)From there, the transmission of power would be available to large population centers, or electrical car recharging centers in rural areas.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)We actually lose more energy transporting electricity than we get. Most depressing EE class I ever took...
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)ever-sunny California. I would like to do that, but my government subsidizes the real costs (I'm including external costs like asthma and cancer and other results of pollution) of other fuels so much and subsidizes the cost of my sending my extra energy to my water and power department so little that it does not make sense for me to put the panels on my house.
I hope that we will, as a nation, one day value the safety and healthiness of solar panels as much as we value the profits of nuclear energy, oil, gas and coal companies and subsidize the installation of solar panels on homes in sunny areas.
demigoddess
(6,644 posts)each house if at all possible. And the roof will put big power outages that cause so much trouble, in the past. Why need to send out crews to repair power lines when a big section of our country is called the sunbelt.
meaculpa2011
(918 posts)is saving us about 40% on our electric bill, but we're still connected to the grid. We lease the hardware and get billed a small amount each month by LIPA.
When the power goes out (several times each year) our system shuts down for the safety of repair crews. I've installed a lockout on the service panel and a generator. We were without electric and heat for a month after Sandy and I don't want to go through that again.
Solar has been great, so far, but for us it doesn't help during a LIPA power outage.
Rainforestgoddess
(436 posts)The installation was free, he pays $80 per month 'rental' but this month, he got a $100 credit on his account from the power company. Net savings for this month was whatever he would normally have paid - say $350 in the summer per month? (guessing) plus $100, minus $80 rental fee = ahead $370.
I'm not sure the name of the company, but I know it's owned by Elon Musk.
edited to add the link to Solar City
DCBob
(24,689 posts)"As of 1980, the longest cost-effective distance for direct-current transmission was determined to be 7,000 km (4,300 mi). For alternating current it was 4,000 km (2,500 mi), though all transmission lines in use today are substantially shorter than this.[7]"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electric_power_transmission
xocet
(3,871 posts)...
http://www.dlr.de/tt/Portaldata/41/Resources/dokumente/institut/system/projects/Ecobalance_of_a_Solar_Electricity_Transmission.pdf
Uncle Joe
(58,405 posts)jeff47
(26,549 posts)that can operate at anywhere close to "normal" temperatures. Long-distance transmission lines cooled by liquid nitrogen is not remotely practical. Not to mention making the coolant would probably use more energy than the transmission losses.
newthinking
(3,982 posts)home.
B2G
(9,766 posts)Where are the details that back this up?
Erich Bloodaxe BSN
(14,733 posts)They're scattered through probably hundreds of journal articles and books all over the place.
You find a map of 'insolation' values for parts of the world, that show just how much solar energy is hitting a given area.
Then you find the amount of that energy able to be captured by solar panels of a given size.
Then you find a listing of the amount of energy actually being used in the world (or, be lazy and simply find out how much energy is being used solely in the US, for instance, and then extrapolate that out across the total population of the world - that will give you an incredibly overlarge value, since we use far more power per person than pretty much any other country out there.)
Do the math to determine how many panels it will take to generate that amount of energy, and then calculate how much total area would have to be covered by that many panels.
You'll wind up with a 'box' of roughly that size in that part of the world.
Now, the legitimate nitpicks that could be offered up is that transmission losses would be enormous if we merely put all of the panels in one place in the world, and thus we need to place the panels all over the world to avoid such losses. And thus, you'll need to cover more area, because most parts of the world don't receive the same amount of insolation as cloudless deserts do.
On the other hand, I'm willing to bet if we added up all of the area in the world covered by rooftops, it would add up to a box of roughly the same size, if not even larger.
Android3.14
(5,402 posts)Use a little commonsense. It makes us all seem smarter.
kg4jxt
(30 posts)just FYI (not directed to Erich specifically), the solar constant is 1360 W/sq. m - that is the solar radiation intensity at the distance from the sun to the earth. The atmosphere absorbs a little bit of the radiation (or a lot if it is cloudy), and the angle of the sunlight on a solar panel affects the amount of power captured. Some solar panels have been made approaching 30% efficiency, but most commercially made panels are around 15%. So a typical square meter panel has a rated capacity around 150 W.
The effective output of solar panels is generally estimated at 6 hours per day, or 0.9 kWh per sq. m; but with sun tracking (which greatly increases the installation cost of the panel array), the effective output can be increased by 50% or more.
Worldwide energy production, according to Wikipedia, for 2008 was 143,851,000,000,000 kWh and increasing at a rate of around 2-5% annually. So, now you can calculate worldwide solar panel demand.
As for batteries, they are a real problem so far. I live on a bank of 20 golf cart batteries, but I do not run air conditioning and sometimes the lights dim when the washing machine starts. So it is a marginal case. Charging efficiency is only about 80%. Pumping water up a hill and regenerating the power when the water runs back down, or driving a locomotive up a mountain and letting it roll back down - these types of kinetic storage are in use along with others, but they are even more inefficient: water pumping and regeneration is only about 30% efficient, a locomotive can do a little better (but costs more).
Several others discuss the transmission problem so I will not belabor it.
Think globally and act locally. Different locations can have different solutions. Solar is pretty easy at the household level; it is getting affordable for most people in the US now. But it is certainly not as easy as hooking to the grid.
sl8
(13,864 posts)Eco-balance of a Solar Electricity Transmission from North Africa to Europe
http://www.dlr.de/tt/Portaldata/41/Resources/dokumente/institut/system/projects/Ecobalance_of_a_Solar_Electricity_Transmission.pdf
This particular graphic is on page 12.
Helen Borg
(3,963 posts)That area could be split up into many different regions...
redqueen
(115,103 posts)I mean, really.
B2G
(9,766 posts)It IS a pretty picture and I got the point, meaning a very small area. I'm all for solar.
I was looking for some details and someone provided that.
LanternWaste
(37,748 posts)"a lot of sensitive types here today..."
I used to rationalize my back-handed compliments too.
greyl
(22,990 posts)"I used to repeat my subject lines in the body of my post."
I mean, I reeeealllly long for it.
PosterChild
(1,307 posts)Squinch
(50,993 posts)But this post communicates a truly great concept. Thank you for it.
duhneece
(4,116 posts)The split up would best serve the world if they provided those jobs in lieu of what we're paying to the highest paid folks at all of the places where they are currently going in the oil and natural gas industries. Save oil for creating plastic for those things that serve us then recycle.
Bigmack
(8,020 posts)I love solar.
I just found out that solar uses a lot of water to clean the panels. Putting the panels in the deserts sounds like such a great idea, but no water there.
A 26 megawatt installation uses 2 acre-feet of water per year just to wash the panels... lots more during the installation phase. And those figures are from the contractor and subject to change upward by reality.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)AlbertCat
(17,505 posts)randome
(34,845 posts)(No pun intended.)
[hr][font color="blue"][center]The truth doesnt always set you free.
Sometimes it builds a bigger cage around the one youre already in.[/center][/font][hr]
tom_kelly
(962 posts)about doing that off of the northeast coast?
On edit: I think they were talking about a floating wind farm.
kristopher
(29,798 posts)Thermal generation is one of the largest water users in the world. They recycle most of it back in, but when water shortages occur or during times of extreme heat, they are severely impacted.
Solar? Not so much at all.
Zorra
(27,670 posts)and reuse it.
Nuclear power plants use enormous amounts of water for cooling, etc, and most of that water evaporates as steam.
Solar is The Way.
A Simple Game
(9,214 posts)JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)And gas fracking may pollute groundwater too much for a state like California.
Nuclear energy also uses a lot of water I gather from the problems at Fukushima.
I have neighbors with solar panels. I had never heard that they use water to clean them.
The final word on solar panel cleaning
The old saying "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" applies - in most residential installation scenarios, solar panel cleaning just isn't worth the bother - or the potential danger if accessing your rooftop. Unless dirt is clearly visible or performance is noticeably impacted; simply let nature do the job for you .
http://www.energymatters.com.au/renewable-energy/solar-power/cleaning-solar-panels.php
Another thing solar panel installers may offer to do is come around and clean your solar panels, again for a fee. I dont get this at all. Without special circumstances, there is no point in getting your solar panels cleaned. Thats what rain is for. Basically, they are self cleaning. Sure, there are exceptions, if youve been hit by a dust storm you may want to hose off the panels, and if, for some reason, your rooftop solar is underneath a tree that has recently been taken over by a colony of fruit bats well, youll probably want to move house because I can tell you now youre in for a crappy time. But for the most part, owners of rooftop solar report very little difference in performance after having their panels cleaned. Even if youre willing to do it yourself, its generally not worth the effort and almost certainly not worth the risk of mucking about on the roof. If you want increased output from your solar panels, rather than clean them, its much easier and more cost effective to simply install a slightly larger system from the beginning, so if you lose a little bit of output from dust and grime its not a problem.
http://cleantechnica.com/2013/04/12/how-to-maintain-and-clean-rooftop-solar-dont/
If you can clean your windows you can certainly clean your solar panels.
The hard part (especially for roof mounted solar panels is reaching them). Assuming you can reach your solar planels - clean the surface of a solar panel much like you would clean your car -- with warm water and dishwashing soap to remove any accumulation of dirt and grime.
http://www.solar-facts-and-advice.com/solar-panel-cleaning.html
If you have windows, you use water to wash them. If you have a car, you use water to wash it.
Solar panels probably don't have to be washed often if at all.
Do you have solar panels? If so, how often co you clean them?
roody
(10,849 posts)autorank
(29,456 posts)You're right, water is key and we're getting a load of b.s. about how it will be sooo... scarce. But, ya know...
The_Commonist
(2,518 posts)Actually, I've long thought that once Saudi Arabia started to run out of oil, it would just turn all that sand in the Rubʿ al Khali into solar panels, and just keep on being one of the planet's largest energy suppliers.
smallcat88
(426 posts)big gas and oil will continue to fight back with BS propaganda. Can't have a workable solution that cuts into their bottom line!
Tyson also noted in the recent Cosmos episode that it would be very easy to supplement with wind power and you don't even have to use land, the windmills can be placed in the water just off the coastline.
mnhtnbb
(31,401 posts)spotted rows and rows of windmills just offshore. These, you can see in the harbor.
smallcat88
(426 posts)I didn't have a pic to go with the statement. Thanks for the visual.
Orrex
(63,220 posts)k/r
A Simple Game
(9,214 posts)Orrex
(63,220 posts)This gets worse and worse!
A Simple Game
(9,214 posts)Now how do we distribute it to everyone?
AllyCat
(16,216 posts)The inability to extrapolate this information into a useful solution. Let me offer some help: look at the top of every building in any community. Do you see that space up there?
Response to AllyCat (Reply #39)
Stryst This message was self-deleted by its author.
Ineeda
(3,626 posts)start with every government building: Every city hall, every courthouse, every police and fire station, every public school, every library, every public administration building, the tops of every light pole in every public parking lot and public road -- the list (and opportunities) goes on and on. Those small wind generators could be substituted if solar was weather-prohibited. Even if the devices powered only the direct need, it would still be huge.
oldhippie
(3,249 posts)I see the space on my building. It is shaded from the sun by other buildings pretty much all day.
Unfortunately, the same with my home. My south facing roof is shaded by oak trees that I will not cut down. I have my small solar panel array on an outbuilding, and even that doesn't get any sun until past noon.
My point is, not all rooftops are suitable for solar panels. A large percentage of them don't get enough direct sun from the south to generate significant power.
kristopher
(29,798 posts)Their output matches the demand peak better and they consequently produce a more valuable product.
I have a house with a completely clear W facing roof, and a large detached garage with a clear S facing roof.
By design.
oldhippie
(3,249 posts)... gets shaded by my rather massive chimney structure. Even with a number of strings and an inverter with multiple MPPT channels I couldn't get it to work.
I once did a comparison between my south facing and west facing roof, assuming they were both clear of shadows. As you say, the west facing roof got almost as much total sun, and it was later in the afternoon at the peak demand period. But in my area there is no time of day differential at all so it didn't make up for the difference in total equivalent sun hours.
AllyCat
(16,216 posts)Are you saying we can't have solar? That is my point. There is a whole host of options for locating solar panels and the onus does not have to rely on the homeowner. Communities can do this to power most or all of their needs. A shaded dwelling does not mean we cannot reap benefits everywhere else.
oldhippie
(3,249 posts)What I was pointing out is that saying "solar on EVERY roof" and "just look at the top of ANY building" is nonsensical.
EVERY and ANY have meanings. EVERY roof and ANY roof are not suitable for solar. I don't know how you stretch that to me saying we can't have solar. We can and we do. (I do, anyway.)
That might work in a small village in India or Somalia or Haiti. But I need to see some engineering numbers to see how you would do that in Manhattan, Chicago, or even Phoenix. Especially the storage.
Maybe it's just my curse of being an engineer. I tend to think about numbers and scale and laws of physics rather than dreams. Engineers have to work in the realm of reality in order to implement other's dreams.
jtuck004
(15,882 posts)sufrommich
(22,871 posts)of the American southwest can clearly see that we have enough unused, open,sunny space for a sea of solar panels.Why don't we have them? Good post.k&r.
DCBob
(24,689 posts)Which would be substantial if a giant solar panel farm was across the globe from the point of consumption.
Plucketeer
(12,882 posts)But the thing you seem to miss is that that required area wouldn't have to BE IN ONE PLACE. That area - spread across many continents and countries would lessen the losses you note, significantly.
BTW, here in Central CA - where there's GOBS of sunlight most of the year - there's a rush of outfits pushing solar systems that you lease. You're locked into a monthly payment for 20 or 25 years. You still have to make a make-up payment to your power supplier, but you have the locked in rate with the leaser. It might be nice to know that your meter is running backwards during the day, but you're not saving much in the end.
To add insult to injury, the power companies have installed new remotely monitored meters on most homes. That means that when they get to raise rates, they'll skew the increases to the dark-time hours to make sure they still get their money.
We have almost a whole acre of bare, flat property we could put panels on. Our best bet would be to buy a system outright - such as you can buy from Costco - and set it up. Yes, you have to have some technical skills - and I happen to have a mechanical/electrical background. If I'm gonna join the solar revolution, that's how I'll approach it.
DCBob
(24,689 posts)to make it practical/cost efficient.
blackspade
(10,056 posts)DCBob
(24,689 posts)To supply the planet with electricity we will need massive solar panel farms located throughout the world.
raouldukelives
(5,178 posts)for animals & humans in the long run. Meanwhile, our economy runs on the manufacturing of arms and the use of them on the poorest people in the world.
Shucks, people got to make a living making a killing. We get to pump up the stock market and someone gets to earn a stripe for pushing the buttons at the same time.
Get with the program, Pyle!
Nye Bevan
(25,406 posts)And quite an expensive job. I would definitely want to use an electrician with a lot of experience, and get quotes from several companies.
stage left
(2,965 posts)Treant
(1,968 posts)I'm taking this as nothing more than an area required in a sunny place.
In real life, we'd decentralize to increase transmission efficiency and also to reduce how juicy a terrorist target the locale would be. Besides, that location would be seeing night-time during half the day, so we'd want to decentralize just to distribute that.
By the time you add in the fact that most areas of the world aren't as consistently sunny, and that there still will be transmission losses, the area is larger. But nobody would bother to bomb my house just to get rid of my power generation if every other house has the same thing on it.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)That's how I read it as well.
saidsimplesimon
(7,888 posts)do anything, after we set our priorities. Then we must take the slow long slog toward winning the victory.
Imho, what we need are sustainable energy sources based on local conditions. In the US, big utilities walk hand in hand with oil and gas manufacturers. They will not stop the march to total rape of fossil resources until we stop buying their propaganda. We must also challenge oil and gas producers, and our congress critters over taxpayer funded profit.
If we are truly exceptional, then so are all humans on this planet who work toward saving life as we know it on this azure planet.
Helen Borg
(3,963 posts)Africa could be the next power production engine of the world. Solar.
progressoid
(49,996 posts)xocet
(3,871 posts)berni_mccoy
(23,018 posts)A better source is here. And it uses a distributed model (energy sources per continent).
http://landartgenerator.org/blagi/archives/127
DCBob
(24,689 posts)Its still quite remarkable though how relatively small a space it would require. I would have thought much larger.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)Nice to see the point isn't completely missed by most.
berni_mccoy
(23,018 posts)Treant
(1,968 posts)I'm thinking terrorist attack, here, and the huge main trunks that would have to lead out from those areas.
House or community projects are going to require more area (as many will be in areas with less sunlight, like my own), but present far less appealing targets.
On the up side, they aren't quite as susceptible to a surprise cloud-cover over the areas, which I'm sure happens occasionally.
Plus I'd like to see us build for the future (for once) and plan with the ability to constantly add to the system anywhere we need to, even if it's a little less efficient and costs more.
Android3.14
(5,402 posts)The OP was so inaccurate I was embarrassed.
karadax
(284 posts)I'm more optimistic than ever that solar power is going to go mainstream. Just wait until we unleash the full potential of graphene. Highly efficient panels attached to fast charging batteries are on the horizon.
rickyhall
(4,889 posts)What if every house, building, parking lot, etc. had panels on top of them? How much area do you suppose that is?
Treant
(1,968 posts)And I like the way you think.
Now convince my HOA that solar panels aren't hideous, beauty-destroying beasts. No installation is allowed if the southern side of your roof faces the road.
Fortunately, ours is not, but it's presently out of our budget by miles. We're working on it.
Android3.14
(5,402 posts)Apparently the entire EU only uses about four times as much energy as Germany alone. Not.
According to eia.gov, in thousands of barrels of oil per day, Germany used 2,388 Kbarrels of oil. The top 15 countries combined used 64,634 Kbarrels, or 27 times as much energy. Total world consumption is 89,000 Kbarrels a day (in thousands of barrels), or 37 times that of Germany.
If the German unit is accurate, the World block needs to be at least twice as large.
I swear, boingboing.net? Really?
Stupid mistake. The OP should take the post down or use her native intelligence to create her own graphic rather than relying on the scientitions at boingboing.
jeff47
(26,549 posts)Nice job trying to add energy from combustion to something talking about electricity usage.
Energy is energy, and it comes in many forms, including electrical energy.
Electricity is one form of energy. One. We generate electricity (convert one form of energy to another) by using heat energy, which we tend to generate mostly by burning fossil fuels.
I have no idea what the snark in your post was for, but it is obtuse at best. I was pointing out that the graphic is blatantly and empirically way off, and I was not criticizing solar energy. I'm all for alternative energy, but I am not going to let some idiotic piece of misinformation from some asswipe of a website called boingboing stand as accurate just because it masturbates a couple of yahoo's fantasy of solar energy.
Science and Reason, I wish we had good public schools.
Logical
(22,457 posts)To be an expert!
lpbk2713
(42,766 posts)Think of all the ridiculous profits they would lose out on.
SoapBox
(18,791 posts)Now what exactly happened during the Cheney Energy Summit?
Oh ya, records are sealed forever.
Enthusiast
(50,983 posts)Just a fact. Kasich just froze spending on renewable energy in Ohio.
blackspade
(10,056 posts)packman
(16,296 posts)I showed this several weeks back when Germany was being hailed as the leader in solar energy development and it isn't even in a favorable zone for solar radiation. The deeper the red color, the richer the energy:
[URL=.html][IMG][/IMG][/URL]
This site gives a country by country map of solar potential and they are free for printing/use:
http://solargis.info/doc/free-solar-radiation-maps-GHI
proverbialwisdom
(4,959 posts)Stanford Professor Mark Jacobson at Pathways to 100% Renewable Energy Conference
April 13, 2013
Wind, water, and solar - PHENOMENAL WORK!
redqueen
(115,103 posts)WillyT
(72,631 posts)Jefferson23
(30,099 posts)K&R
hunter
(38,325 posts)There are plenty of rooftops, parking lots, abandoned mines, and other severely disturbed environments upon which solar might be installed.
Also, in California at least, solar and wind are often promoted to gain approval for east-to-west power transfer facilities, the purpose of which is not to increase our use of renewable energy, but to increase the capacity to import cheap dirty highly profitable coal generated electricity.
A similar thing happened in Germany. They shut their nuclear plants and solar and wind were used as greenwash as they built new fossil fuel plants to replace the nuclear plants.
nolabels
(13,133 posts)power at our own personal place of existence. They like the old way, where they distribute and collect the proceeds as they see fit.
A building of a power grid that supplies the world could be built if we could cut out the greedy corporations from of the equation.
Remember the sun is always shining somewhere in world
doc03
(35,363 posts)exboyfil
(17,865 posts)projects usage of 46,000 sq miles of solar panels in southwest to provide 90% of U.S. energy needs.
Assume 150,000 sq miles for world needs you would have 387 miles on a side which is very close to the world box.
http://web.chem.ucsb.edu/~feldwinn/greenworks/Readings/solar_grand_plan.pdf
We need high efficiency DC power lines. It is all doable with a reasonable level of technology. Should be done in conjunction with diversified approach (trade off for more efficiency vs. extra cost and losses associated with transmission).
mathematic
(1,439 posts)Is anybody saying "if only we had more land for these power plants?"
How much land do coal plants take up? How much land do nuclear plants take up?
The claim in the OP is an incredibly misleading manipulation. It abuses the fact that human construction is actually a small portion of land use to suggest that there is something easy or straightforward, etc, to going completely solar. Lack of space has never been an obstacle to solar adoption and it never will be.
edhopper
(33,606 posts)what would we do for power at night.
We would have to build two set ups on either side of the Earth and then lots of cable.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)It isn't saying WE MUST BUILD THESE RIGHT HERE WHERE THEY ARE ON THIS MAP.
edhopper
(33,606 posts)redqueen
(115,103 posts)treestar
(82,383 posts)The number of posts taking that literally is amazing!
redqueen
(115,103 posts)This guy is mocking them. Too bad there are enough serious ones that it's hard to tell!
TheKentuckian
(25,029 posts)edhopper
(33,606 posts)jtuck004
(15,882 posts)Gravitycollapse
(8,155 posts)edhopper
(33,606 posts)wtmusic
(39,166 posts)And it's a pleasure to find some common ground with you Ed.
SleeplessinSoCal
(9,135 posts)White ones to reflect the sun like the melted ice once did.
edgineered
(2,101 posts)And without all the ugliness of framework, cables, guy lines, etc.
Making it look like we never f*****d it up, would be a nice memorial for our children's children, when they get old and remember how grand the 'good old days' were.
SleeplessinSoCal
(9,135 posts)TrollBuster9090
(5,955 posts)Yep, the BP oil spill, that turned the entire gulf of Mexico into a giant oil smudge was about five times bigger than the area needed to power the world with solar panels.
That means, if California alone set up a few panels, they could power the whole country. A few more in Arizona,maybe.
Although, personally, I think it makes more sense to use either windfarms, or (for those who can't stand the sight of windmills) underwater turbines powered by currents.
Erich Bloodaxe BSN
(14,733 posts)Autism spectrum or maybe OCD?
Whether they use the 'inaccurate' initial pic, or the one much farther down in the comments, the point is the same - to generate all of the electricity used by mankind through solar, it would only take a tiny fraction of the world's land surface, and not a ton more even if you distribute a lot of it across areas that don't get 'peak insolation' during the day.
Thanks again for the reminder. I'd love to see all of the coal plants shut down, and no more mountains destroyed for corporate profits.
wercal
(1,370 posts)So here are the numbers:
World electricity consumption - 20,000 TWh (this excludes other forms of energy...just looking at the current electrical load).
The world's largest solar farm is the Ivanpah solar farm. It has just been completed, and presumably is representative of the returns we can expect to get from a large scale solar farm. Its in the desert...not a North African desert, but a desert nonetheless - 7.4 kW h/m2/day. So let's look at it. It is rated at 1.05 TWh/year.
So...we would need 19,047 Ivanpah plants to supply the world's electrical needs. The solar field at Ivanpah is 28,000,000 square feet....around 642 acres. But Ivanpah is much bigger than that - 3,400 acres. This is because the solar panels cannot be laid adjacent to each other, like floor tiles. There has to be room to move between panels, in order to be able to clean/repair/replace panels. BTW, I suggest going to Google maps and typing in Ivanpah...from the air, it looks huge.
So, 19,047 Ivanpahs would be 64,759,800 acres....or 101,187 square miles....or something 318 miles square. Looking at the scale of the map, it looks like the box shown is very close to that.
Now looking at costs - Ivanpah costs $2.2 billion to build. Assuming no maintenance or operational costs, and a wholesale cost of power of 7 cents per KWh, Ivanpah generates $72,800,000 worth of power every year....or in 30 years, without any maintenance or operational costs (and assuming the panels last that long without needing replacement), the cost will have broken even. Of course there are operational and maintenance costs...and 40 years it probably a still a low estimate of payback period.
So it comes down to environmental benefits.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)Multiply what Ivanpah is "rated" at by .20. Now multiply that by its efficiency of converting sunlight to electricity: .28.
Now add all the cost of the fossil plants you're going to need to fire up when there's a week of cloudy weather (yes, it happens), or when the sun moves behind the earth (happens every day).
Non-starter.
nolabels
(13,133 posts)There are probably many things that cannot calculated at present place in reality we are in. To set out to build or facilitate construction of a large vast and varied solar array will take time (but how much time it's also hard to tell). New and innovative design and manufacturing techniques that make those solar cell two to ten or more times efficient. The problems are numerous but so are the answers. The panels that power my house are dated but only installed 4.5 years ago. They now have ones twice as efficient (which means half the size) besides being cheaper and lighter.
Fossil fuels are in a fight for their lives and they are losing. Things also one might consider is as more minds, inventors , ventures or just us plain ole ordinary folks are getting involved, this will make things change even faster.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)and extensive calculations are being performed every day.
It's not rocket science. Take the area mentioned in the OP and calculate how much it would cost to cover it with solar panels, even at today's low prices. It would cost more money than has ever existed in the world. Adding transmission and backup for nighttime/clouds only makes the obvious more so.
Solar is entirely incapable of meeting the world's energy needs. The coal/natural gas/oil industries don't want you to understand that because it's serving as a very convenient cover for them to sell even more of their dirty product. As I pointed out downthread, it's a fossil fuel windfall.
nolabels
(13,133 posts)Twenty years ago they said it would be impossible to clean up the smokestack on them trucks on enough in that effort to make them as clean burning as an auto. Well on the new trucks that they are building now, they are as clean burning as autos, so it has been done.
There always someone that says they are smarter and know better, but then again there are them dreamers, those are the people that actually make it happen. But keep on saying we cannot do something, it only gives us more juice to do it even better than before
brett_jv
(1,245 posts)I understand the part where, at today's prices, this scale of a project in not feasible, would cost more money than has ever existed, etc (not that this means we SHOULDN'T attempt it, mind you, but I see what *I think* your point is.
But you totally lose me on this part:
"Solar is entirely incapable of meeting the world's energy needs. The coal/natural gas/oil industries don't want you to understand that because it's serving as a very convenient cover for them to sell even more of their dirty product."
Did you mean to say 'capable' rather than 'incapable'? Because regardless of the economic reality of the situation, why would the fossil fuel industries NOT want us to think that solar is 'incapable'? Isn't that exactly what they WOULD want us to think?
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)because they will never constitute a challenge to fossils' dominance, and can be cynically employed for "green" credentials.
After 50 years of development and $billions in investment, solar provides less than 1% of U.S. electricity. Wind provides more, ~5%. While both are viable in very select areas of the world, they're completely incapable of addressing the overwhelming challenge of climate change. This is for a number of reasons, but mostly variability, energy density, and expense (solar is 30% more expensive than nuclear).
The poster child for this strategy, T. Boone Pickens, is attempting to corner the American gas market by erecting wind turbines:
Many critics of the Pickens Plan highlight ways that Pickens could potentially benefit personally from the plan. For instance, Pickens owns the water rights to a huge ancient aquifer in the Texas Panhandle and overall owns more water than anyone else in the U.S. Increasing water demands and drought may make cities in the Great Plains willing to purchase water at high prices. Implementing Pickens Plan would give him rights to build electric transmission lines, and by getting a wider right of way it would allow Pickens to build water pipelines.
A similar strategy was attempted in Texas, where Pickens is building a wind farm that will bring electricity to Dallas, Texas. The proposed pipeline would have followed the same 250-mile (400 km) corridor as the electric transmission lines from the wind farms, which was to be seized for utility use from private owners through eminent domain. Many Texas landowners and legislators denounced the plan, particularly the fact that it allowed eminent domain to be exercised by an agency consisting only of T. Boone Pickens's employees. In September 2008, the water pipeline was suspended. T. Boone Pickens continues to purchase water rights in the Great Plains and has plans to build more, smaller wind farms.
T. Boone Pickens would be in an excellent position to benefit financially if the plan is implemented. His hedge fund, BP Capital, is highly invested in wind and natural gas enterprises. He is the majority stockholder of Clean Energy, the largest supplier of natural gas for vehicles in the United States.
wercal
(1,370 posts)A 320 mile square of solar panels is a little unrealistic.
I just ran the numbers to see if the 'footprint' was accurate. Now the number I used for Ivanpah is not a 'before losses' type of number - its the actual power output, expected annually....realistically. So, indeed, a 100k square mile version of Ivanpah would power the world.
The reason I was curious to check...I'm sure this graphic was born out of an image from the Neil Tyson Degrasse tv show. He showed a similar graphic. So its being recycled, and I just wanted to test accuracy....and it pans out. And, presumably, a network of smaller plants scattered throughout the equator would always see daylight somewhere...theoretically possible.
But I did also run some numbers on cost...which most people here tend to completely ignore. The cost is outrageous...and the 'break even' time frame is pushing the limit of what I would expect to be the longevity of the mirrors and panels...and as I pointed out this is without factoring in operational costs (those reflectors in the desert aren't just going to dust themselves off!).
And my last teaser was a nod to its environmental benefits. Nobody bit on that one. I honestly don't know how much c02 is released in making acres and acres of mirrors, but intuitively I think its a lot. So the c02 benefit is likely overstated. Nobody bit on that one.
But I also encouraged people to Google the site...and look at its enormous scale. Sure the surrounding area is 'just desert', but there is some vegetation. Well, Ivanpah displaced a lot of that. And there is the tortoise - the same tortoise that has caused thousands of square miles of land to be off limits to grazing, off-roading, even military exercises at Ft Irwin. Ivanpah is smack in the middle of its habitat - with a special exemption. Why? I guess solar is 'holier' than other desert activities.
And, it turns out, Ivanpah is killing birds like crazy.
So I actually think huge solar plants are a bad idea, and (short of technological breakthroughs to reduce cost) won't be our energy future.
bananas
(27,509 posts)Solar costs are going down and will continue to do so:
May 23, 2014
Barclays this week downgrades the entire electric sector of the U.S. high-grade corporate bond market to underweight, saying it sees long-term challenges to electric utilities from solar energy ...
... the cost of solar + storage for residential consumers of electricity is already competitive with the price of utility grid power in Hawaii. Of the other major markets, California could follow in 2017, New York and Arizona in 2018, and many other states soon after...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1014&pid=814828
wercal
(1,370 posts)...since they don't have a lot of natural resources on the island. So I'm not surprised solar is competitive there.
Especially when factoring in the 30% federal tax credit for installation, and 35% state tax credit.
Do you understand that? Their power is triple what is normal in cost, and only after having 2/3 of the installation paid for by incentives, is it competitive with more conventional sources.
In my book, that isn't remotely close to cost competitive.
Oh yeah, they also have net metering, by law. I find this offensive and immoral, as a typical rate payer. In case you don't know what that means, solar users get to sell their excess power at the retail rate, vs the wholesale rate.
Think about that - they want to sell their power to the grid. And the power company maintains the lines, repairs them after storms, has redundancy, has fail-safes to prevent overload and underload conditions...all of which cost them money, which is passed on to the rate payer. But Johnny solar owner gets to use those very same lines for FREE, and sell his power back at RETAIL....all because a solar company lobbied enough lawmakers in Hawaii to do such an immoral thing.
If you take away the net metering, the sell back is reduced by around 5 cents a kwh...changes the equation by almost a factor of two.
So lets review. A good citizen of Hawaii gets to:
1. Pay a portion of the federal subsidy
2. Pay a portion of the state subsidy
3. Pay eternally for net metering
but "Nobody is ignoring costs".
Solar isn't there yet. It doesn't even fall into the category of an emerging industry that just needs a few years of government protection, to get off the ground. Its struggles to even meet the test of viability. Add to that - much of the subsidies discussed above are due to expire in 2015.
bananas
(27,509 posts)That's solar plus storage, solar itself is already competitive for peak-load in many areas.
If you really find net-metering "offensive and immoral" then you're extremely misinformed - it's not your fault, there's a lot of conservative right-wing misinformation out there.
Actually, your entire post is full of misinformation.
For example, you falsely claim:
But the scientifically verifiable reality is:
A 2012 report on the cost of net metering in the State of California, commissioned by the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), ... found that solar customers do pay more on their power bills than what it costs the utility to serve them (Table 5, page 10: average 103% of their cost of service across the three major utilities in 2011).[14]
... an independent report conducted by the consulting firm Crossborder Energy found that the benefits of California's net metering program outweigh the costs to ratepayers. Those net benefits will amount to more than $92 million annually upon the completion of the current net metering program.[15]
So you have it exactly backwards - the reality is net-metering saves ratepayers money, and it is "offensive and immoral" for the utilities to prevent people from using the electric lines they are paying for, in fact paying over and above what it costs the utility to manage them.
You also mistakenly believe:
In reality, the history of net-metering in the US goes back to Jimmy Carter:
History
United States
The first form of feed-in tariff (under another name) was implemented in the US in 1978 under President Jimmy Carter, who signed the National Energy Act (NEA). This law included five separate Acts, one of which was the Public Utility Regulatory Policies Act (PURPA). The purpose of the National Energy Act was to encourage energy conservation and develop new energy resources, including renewables such as wind, solar and geothermal power.[20][21]
Within PURPA was a provision that required utilities to purchase electricity generated from qualifying independent power producers at rates not to exceed their avoided cost.[21] Avoided costs were designed to reflect the cost that a utility would incur to provide that same electrical generation.
I've never heard anyone call Jimmy Carter "immoral", even ultra-right-wing conservatives consider him "moral".
wercal
(1,370 posts)I'll try to keep up:
1. "California could follow..." does absolutely NOTHING to refute my contention that federal, state, and net metering subsidies are financing the gap in the true cost of Solar vs traditional power sources. Assuming that its fucking impossible to subsidize everybody's power, this formula does not work long term...and the logical conclusion is that solar is not presently viable. Talk to me when solar is cost competitive in any state without subsidy.
2. So your take away from the entire Wikipedia article on net-metering is one link to the one part of the article that fits your view? And a study done (no doubt by solar advocates) in the one state that is famous for rolling blackouts, and has an impending infrastructure cost to build new power plants, which could be delayed in theory by using net metering? Well, I guess that trumps all the utility companies that are now trying to set net metering tariff fees, to make up for their losses. Sorry, I guarantee that you have it 100% wrong. Where I live, we DO NOT HAVE ROLLING BLACKOUTS. Ergo, there is no advantage to the power utility WHATSOEVER to net meter. Please tell me if I'm wrong - what advantage is there to the power company, if it already has capacity (and capacity built in for the next quarter century). And then tell me why its moral for me to pay for Johnny solar.
I'll simplify this for you:
Power company cost to make kwh = 7 cents
Power company transmission costs = 4 cents
Power company profit = 1 cent
So the retail rate = 12 cents
What exactly do you think happens when the power company buys power at the retail rate? Here:
Purchase cost = 12 cents
Transmission costs = 4 cents
Total cost = 16 cents
Sale cost = 12 cents
Loss = 4 cents
Well how does the power company handle the loss? You guessed it - they raise rates.
So please explain to me how on earth it is not immoral for Johnny solar to shove a 4 cent fee onto me for every kwh he sells back to the utility company. Why does Johnny get a free ride? I pay for transmission costs for both myself and him - why? And how is it moral? It isn't.
3. I really have no idea why a story about Jimmy Carter has anything to do with Hawaii and net metering....and how that automatically means that the solar lobby couldn't possibly be behind net metering laws. Its an illogical conclusion to make. (Fun fact, his vice president celebrated the commissioning of my power plant back in the 70s...you know, the one that still has capacity). Anyway, you are desperately crying out to be educated, so here goes:
Hawaii's first net metering law was in 2001. Maybe you should re-read that: 2001. Nothing to do with Jimmy Carter, as if that mattered. And you are under a pile of rocks if you don't believe large business interests, involved in the solar industry, had nothing to do with passage of that law.
Now, if you bother to read the articles you link to, you will understand that the law signed by Carter deals with 'avoided costs', NOT RETAIL RATES. Do you understand that?
Once again I will simplify:
1978 - Carter signs PURPA into law
2001 - Hawaii starts net metering
conclusion - Either Hawaii was in violation of the law for 23 consecutive years OR it is possible to comply with PURPA without net metering at retail rates.
Get that? Jimmy's morality has NOTHING to do with the current retail rates. You are convoluting a law designed to counter-act the power of a monopolistic power company, by forcing them to buy all generated power, at COST, with a very different and very immoral scheme to impose RETAIL rates on the power company.
Go find some more links....but read them next time.
bananas
(27,509 posts)aint_no_life_nowhere
(21,925 posts)In the early 1970s i remember hearing a radio interview on Pacifica radio with two NASA scientists. They said even back then we had the technology to place giant solar panels in outer space and beam the 24 hour a day energy back to Earth via microwave and all we lacked was the financial commitment and political will to do it.
lovemydog
(11,833 posts)Let's get on this everyone!
emsimon33
(3,128 posts)We just need better distribution grids.
Kablooie
(18,638 posts)DFW
(54,436 posts)He told me back in 2008 that he estimated that a ten mile square ( 100 Sq. Mi.) solar grid, maybe out in the Arizona desert (his words) would be enough to supple the electricity needs of the whole United States. All we had to do is build it, which the oil companies would not like.
Response to redqueen (Original post)
Post removed
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)Merkels Green Shift Backfires as German Pollution Jumps
Germany now EU's worst polluter as CO2 emissions rise
Germany Returns to Coal
Less Nuclear Energy Means More Coal, Natural Gas -- And Carbon Emissions
Green Energy Bust in Germany
Ooh, let's take a nation-sized disaster and make it a global one!
Solar power advocates are laughably, irreconcilably naive tools of the fossil fuel industry. Have a nice day.
nolabels
(13,133 posts)Also looking at those links i see just a lot of reconfiguring in Germany because of them taking some nuclear reactors off line (mothballed).
You surmise somehow that Germany is somehow having a disaster, personally to me it looks more like Merkel is on her way out and that is just mostly a problem for the people who would like to turn Germany to the right.
Good luck with the greenwash though
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)Good luck with your denial
intaglio
(8,170 posts)Good luck with your denial.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)Are you implying solar is not profitable?
redqueen
(115,103 posts)Increased coal is due to decomissioned nuclear power plants. It's nothing to do with solar power.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)and solar isn't picking up the slack.
Germans apparently still want their power, and are willing to substitute a form which is 4,000x as deadly.
redqueen
(115,103 posts)In this one it's completely unrelated.
wtmusic
(39,166 posts)Germany's rise in CO2 emissions is directly related to their homegrown renewables debacle known as the Energiewende.
Do me a favor and respond specifically to the points raised in the last link. Otherwise this is a waste of my time.
DonCoquixote
(13,616 posts)the equivalent for north america?
padruig
(133 posts)A few years back the authors of "Freakonomics", Levitt and Dubner, and later in "Superfreakonomics" made some fairly unique observations about the economics of climate.
In response, Raymond Pierrehumbert posted in RealClimate.org a fair and reasoned answer to the economic model of planetary science. A worth while read ...
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/10/an-open-letter-to-steve-levitt/
Humanist_Activist
(7,670 posts)centralized plants in the middle of deserts, thousands of miles from where the electricity is needed means you will need a larger surface area to make up for transmission losses.
brett_jv
(1,245 posts)As of now, the world has reached 'historic global peak oil production'. Coal and Uranium are not far behind.
Unfortunately, though, due to the one-time historical bonanza of near-free energy in the form of fossil fuels and discovery of how to split the atom, we have wildly exceeded our planets carrying capacity.
As such, there will be no solar, or wind, or nuclear 'miracle' that will allow 'business as usual' to continue. It's not (just) because of evil 'oil companies', it's because of physics, chemistry, and human nature/greed that we are in the position we're in right now. We've lived it up, we've cast our lot with fossil fuels, and it's because we all had a particular vision of what our 'way of life' is supposed to be, and we've set about 'living it', with no regard for the long term.
Had we been more realistic, more COMMUNISTIC, more ENVIRONMENTALISTIC ... starting 50-60 years ago, when M. King Hubbert and Club of Rome began sounding the warnings ... had we truly admitted to ourselves what was coming and had we CARED enough to plan for the welfare of future generations ... had we acted as a global community instead of a bunch of Ayn Randian's ... we MAYBE (depending on how we implemented it) could've avoided the fate that is now on our immediate horizon for hundreds of years, maybe even a millennium.
But we didn't.
Greed, comfort, and consumption, along w/a total lack of respect for the natural world and the obviously inherent limits to the resources of a finite planet ruled the day ... and now, we are staring at a situation where all but 1 Billion (2 billion at MOST) humans will almost certainly be dead by 2100, and those left alive will enjoy nothing even remotely like the standard of living the WE have in this world.
And barring a miracle like Fusion suddenly working, there ain't a f***ing thing any of us can do about it. Solar Energy will NEVER be the solution we're hoping for, because we needed to make it a worldwide focus about 50 years ago ... it's WAY too friggin late now. We would've needed to start transitioning all our ships, all our planes, all our tractors, and of course all our cars (or better yet, cut out 'personal autos' altogether) ... onto electricity as their power source many decades ago ... and we didn't.
The sheer amount of energy and cost that would involved in converting our WORLD infrastructure over to ANY source of electricity (and Solar is the MOST expensive form in the short-to-mid term) before we start really running out of fossil fuels ... is more than what can be provided BY those fossil fuels. And that's not even counting the power we need to continue 'life as we know it'.
There will be no 'lets power the whole world with solar' solution. Again, barring a miracle (which is NOT presently on the horizon), there will likely be no 'solution' of any kind to the looming 'Long Emergency' that's in our future. Only 6-7 billion people dying off, because we FAILED to plan for the future. It's too late now. The die is cast. Glad I'm almost 50, that's all I can say ...
Warren DeMontague
(80,708 posts)We need to start thinking big, as a planet.
Working together I think there is very little humanity could not achieve.